Science
Contact Andrea Mazzocchi
Science at Quaritch is broadly defined, ranging from medicine, anatomy, pharmacology (including herbals) and natural history to astronomy, physics, chemistry and mathematics.
An interest in the origins of modern chemistry has led to a specialisation in works on alchemy and distillation, and from there we have also branched out into occultism and hermeticism. We have developed an interest in gastronomy and books on nutrition and wine, an area which over the years has become one of our specialities.-
EHRLICH, Paul.
Autograph letter, signed, addressed to ‘herr hospitalmeister’.
[Frankfurt,] ‘Westendstrasse 62’, [no date].
A brief note by the bacteriologist Paul Ehrlich (1854–1915), pioneer of haematology and discoverer of salvarsan, to a local hospital director, regarding notes on the bulletin board.
£750
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EMSWORTH, D.
Le cheval & le chien.
Brussels, widow Parent & Son, and Paris, Charles Tanera, 1865.
Very rare French treatise on horses and dogs. The majority of the work is devoted to horses, discussing their breeds, diseases, training, and racing, with a chapter on the Rarey method.
£375
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ESTIENNE, Charles.
De re vestiaria libellus, ex Bayfio excerptus: addita vulgaris linguae interpretatione, in adulesce[n]tuloru[m]...
Paris, Robert Estienne, 1536.
A wonderful sammelband of four children’s books compiled and published by the Estiennes, covering Roman dress and vases as well as plants and trees, bound with Antonio Telesio’s celebrated treatise on colours.
£2250
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EUCLID.
Στοιχειων βιβλ. ιε εκ των θεωνος συνουσιων. Εις του αυτου του πρωτον,...
Basel, Johannes Herwagen, September 1533.
Editio princeps of Euclid, the ‘oldest mathematical textbook still in common use today’ (PMM), a work which ‘has exercised an influence upon the human mind greater than that of any other work except the Bible’ (DSB).
£18000
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FALCONER, William.
Remarks on the Influence of Climate, Situation, Nature of Country, Population, Nature of Food, and Way of Life,...
London, C. Dilly, 1781.
First edition of Falconer’s pioneering contribution to the late Enlightenment’s study of environmental forces on society.
£1750
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[FARSARI, Adolfo, Studio of.]
Japanese flower seller.
[Yokohama?, c. 1887.]
A striking image of a Japanese flower vendor, with delicate contemporary hand colouring, most notably to the flowers. After time spent in America, where he fought in the Civil War, Adolfo Farsari (1841 - 1898) moved to Japan in 1873, establishing himself in Yokohama. In 1885 he opened his own...
£200
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FENNING, Daniel.
The Ready Reckoner; or Trader’s most useful Assistant, in buying and selling all sorts of Commodities either...
London, printed for S. Crowder … and B.C. Collins … in Salisbury, 1785.
First edition thus, edited by the mathematician and almanack-maker Joseph Moon of Salisbury.
£250
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FINÉ, Oronce.
Opere di Orontio Fineo … divise in cinque parti, arimetica, geometria, cosmografia, e orivoli, tradotte da...
Venice, Francesco Franceschi, 1587.
First Italian edition of the works of Finé. Among the most influential scientific scholars of the sixteenth century, over three decades at the Collège Royale Oronce Finé (1494–1555) made considerable contributions to various branches of mathematics, from geometry and arithmetic to astronomy...
£2750
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[FIRST AID – RAILWAYS.]
Ministère des chemins de fer, postes et télégraphes. Administration des chemins de fer de l’état. Manuel...
Gand, F.& R. Buyck Frères, 1912.
First separate edition, as far as we are aware with no institutional holdings, of this guide to first aid in a railway context, published by the state railway administration of Belgium.
£195
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FLEMING, Alexander, Sir.
On the antibacterial Action of Cultures of a Penicillium, with special Reference to their Use in...
[London, H.K. Lewis & Co., 1944.]
Second edition of Fleming’s study announcing the discovery of penicillin, one of 250 copies which Fleming commissioned to be printed in 1944. The original offprint, issued in 1929 in 150 copies and liberally distributed by Fleming to the scientific community at large for the prompt furthering...
£4000
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FREUD, Sigmund.
Die Zukunft einer Illusion.
Leipzig/Vienna/Zürich, Internationaler Psychoanalytischer Verlag, 1927.
First edition, in the first issue of 5000 copies, of Freud’s work on the origins and future development of religion (the ‘illusion’ of the title), centred on the notion of religion as, in one form or another, wish-fulfilment and the longing for a paternal figure as a response to a realisation...
£85
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FREUD, Sigmund.
Moses and monotheism [translated from the German by Katherine Jones].
New York, Alfred A, Knopf, 1939.
First American edition of the last lifetime publication of Freud, a study of the origins of monotheism in Judaism and Christiantity, where Freud took as his point of departure the theory that Moses was not an Israelite but an Egyptian, who imported the seeds of Judaism into Israel from Egypt. The book...
£80
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FRONTINUS, Sextus Julius.
Sexti Julii Frontini, viri consularis, quae extant. Robertus Keuchenius, S. F. notis et emendationibus...
Amsterdam, Johann à Waesberge, 1661.
The collected works of the first-century civil engineer and Roman general Frontinus, one-time governor of Roman Britain, edited and with extensive notes by the Dutch historian Robert Keuchen (1636–1673).
£250
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GABARO, Antonio.
Alla pregiatissima Signora Domenica Schiavon Menato nella fausta occasione del suo primo parto, in argomento...
Padua, ‘Nella Tipografia del Seminario’, 1820.
First and only edition, very rare, of a scathing and sexist condemnation of ‘inhuman’ women who do not breastfeed their own children, dedicated to Domenica Schiavon Menato, ‘an example to all women’, on the occasion of the birth of her first child.
£380
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[GALEN.] STEPHANUS.
Stephani Atheniensis philosophi explanationes in Galeni priorem librum therapeuticum ad Glauconem, Augustino...
Venice, Giunta, November 1554.
First edition of Agostino Gadaldini’s Latin translation of Galen’s medical treatise Ad Glauconem and of Stephanus’ commentary upon it, enhanced with his own scholia.
£950
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GARSAULT, François-Alexandre de.
Le nouveau parfait maréchal, ou la connoissance générale et universelle du cheval, divisé...
Paris, Moreau for Hochereau, 1770.
Fourth edition of one of the most popular French horsemanship manuals. First published in 1741 as a successor to Solleysel’s famous Parfait maréchal and reprinted in at least sixteen editions over the following century, Le nouveau parfait maréchal ‘is considered to be the best...
£650
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GASPARIN, Agénor Étienne, Comte de.
Des tables tournantes du surnaturel en général et des esprits par le Cte Agénor de Gasparin.
Paris, Bonaventure and Ducessois for E. Dentu, 1854.
Scarce first edition of Gasparin’s early experiments in table-turning – a form of séance in which tables appear to rotate or levitate of their own accord – which would prove highly controversial and integral to the nineteenth-century Spiritualist movement.
£1500
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GAYOT DE PITAVAL (Conseil).
Question d’estat: fille reclamée par deux meres.
Paris, Nicolas le Gras, 1716.
First edition of this account by the famous advocate François Gayot de Pitaval (1673–1743) of a 1709 case, where a midwife had substituted a new-born girl who was then claimed both by the real mother and the woman to whom the baby had been given. Pitaval’s account details the principles by...
£350
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GERARDE, John; Thomas JOHNSON, editor.
The Herball or general Historie of Plantes … very much enlarged and amended …
London, Printed by Adam Islip, Joice Norton, and Richard Whitakers, 1633.
Second edition of Gerard’s Herball, edited and expanded by Thomas Johnson, with an extensive new set of Plantin woodcuts and a hand-coloured engraved title by John Payne.
£3250
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GIBELLI, Giacinto.
Due dissertazioni sopra li vantaggi, che si ottengono in medicina dall’uso del ferro per guarire molte infermità,...
Genoa, Paolo Scionico, 1767.
First and only edition, rare, of these treatises on the medicinal benefits of iron supplements, with accounts of their use by the author in curing over 450 patients of maladies ranging from anorexia to melancholy.
£600